Twenty years ago a doctor who had a seriously sick patient was trying an experimental treatment to raise his hemoglobin. His level was six at the time of diagnosis, which is dangerously deficient. Each week she did a blood test, aware that a plus or minus of .2 was within the range of error. The young boy endured these blood draws with courage, while his anxious mother looked on. The next week the result was 6.2, so the doctor shook her head, saying it was not a sign of improvement. Over the next two months the number crept up, always within the margin of error, and since the doctor only compared the number to the week before she did not believe the boy was improving. By the time his hemoglobin was 7.2 she again shook her head in discouragement. But the boy's mother was able to see past the numbers. 

 

"Doctor, my son is getting better! Look at him!"

 

It was true, he had more color and energy. She had completely missed it.

 

At one point my mother was very anemic. We took her to the doctor who admitted her for tests. Her hemoglobin was a four. While she was waiting for a transfusion, several nurses came to poke their heads in her room. 

 

"We just wanted to see the person who has a four and is still alive!" 

 

When she came home she had pink in her face, and could stand long enough to make toast. While we never understood the reason for her lower iron levels, we were grateful for a treatment. 

 

I have been keeping notes about Benjamin for three years. Just little memos about whether he did chores, or had a meltdown, or walked with a buddy. It can be hard to digest them collectively, but it helps me make sense of the changing dynamics. It is easy for me to lose sight of his progress, if I get caught up in the events of one day. Or even three. But when I take a moment to reread the descriptions across months and seasons, I am awash with gratitude. He has a meaningful life. He completed an internship with several rotations. He has gone weeks at a time without becoming irate, and even when he is it usually lasts twenty minutes, not five hours like it once did. 

 

If I walk through the woods it becomes obvious that not every tree is strong, or straight, or even healthy. And yet the collective majesty of a forest is made up of them.